Corrections and Updates

Corrections:   I made a couple of errors in the previous post on Niue. I incorrectly reported the name of Palaha Cave as Palava Cave. I also misinterpreted what I had read about the two-tier formation of Niue. These errors have now been corrected in the original post.

Updates:   

I have heard from several people that they have "dropped off the blog" or that they no longer receive email notices of our blog updates. Following by email is a function of the "Blogger" program via Feedburner; there is not a distribution list that Patrick and I keep. Now that we know the problem is widespread we'll investigate it.

We made it safely to the Kingdom of Tonga on October 4 (October 3 U.S. time.) It took us awhile to find the wind, but after we did, the first 36 hours of our passage were lovely sailing with Silhouette rolling gently over the easy swells. During our last night out, however, we got into a convergence zone between the southeast trades and a low system to the north. We experienced continuous lightening (luckily, it was not too close), pouring rain (Patrick brought out the ski goggles since he could not even see the bow at one point), wind clocking around to every direction, and finally, the swells to match. The next morning, the wind completely died, and we ended up motoring the rest of the way to Vava'u (one of the northern island groups in Tonga.) Currently, we are in the port city of Neiafu.